John Sturdy: My values

The overall scheme

I see virtues in two main areas: virtues of strength, and
virtues of kindliness. Without strength, kindliness would be weak
and ineffectual, so I include as virtues some things that many
would describe as rough edges.

The core

My core values are:

when you have the choice, you should
act so as not to constrain
someone else's choice of actions; and particularly, not to press them
towards doing something against their will, or, most
importantly, even against their better judgement.

To make the right decisions, you need correct information,
that is, you need to know the truth.
Therefore, you should
stick to the truth, both in terms of not hiding
it from others, and also of not hiding from it yourself.

to get someone to do something that you want them to do but
that they don't want to do; for example, getting someone
to treat you in such a way as to enhance your imagined
social standing. There are many detailed ramifications of
this; it can affect all sorts
of minor decisions in
quite a practical way.

Don't crowd people

into being ``close'' to you when that's not how they
actually feel towards you.

As a basic property right as expressed in the Commandment
"Do not steal".

This is because theft means that someone who worked to
produce something for themselves, has turned out to have
been working to produce something for you, and thus you have
appropriated control (retrospectively) over them for the
time they took to make it.

Trust is that by which people can work together; having agreed
something between them, one person can then do something on the
assumption that the other person will do a particular thing -- for
a small example, they can agree to meet at a particular time and
place; or, for a larger example, they can agree to be life-long
partners.